As we are on the brim of a technological revolution (Industry 4.0), it is very clear that there is going to be major change in the way we live, work, and communicate with one another. The transformation is going to be one of its own kinds that humans would never have experienced before. Even though with its humongous complexity levels, it is believed to be bring in new opportunities for almost all stakeholders (the public and private sectors to academia and civil society) across the globe.

As compared to the previous industrial revolutions, the Fourth is evolving at an exponential rather than a linear pace. This is a major reason for such disruption in all most all the industries. This is also causing shortage of skilled talent in the international market. Today in many countries & industries, the most in-demand occupations or specialties didn’t even exist 5 or ten years ago. And this speed of change is set to accelerate.

The ways in which billions of people are connected by mobile devices, with extraordinary processing power and storage capacity, have gone beyond imaginable reach. In future, these possibilities will be multiplied by emerging technology breakthroughs in fields such as artificial intelligence, DNA computing, crypto-currency, robotics, the Internet of Things, bio-printing, autonomous vehicles, nanotechnology, quantum computing, materials science, energy storage, and biotechnology.

The quick technological progresses and the digitization, are forcing businesses to transform their workplaces to ‘work-labs’. This is making it harder for employees to match their skill sets with the needs of employers. This is altering the way we work. The employees’ skills will need to keep pace with these changes.

The scale of the problem is varying from country to country. As per a survey, it has hit the Japan firms the most, where 81% of firms are having difficulty finding qualified employees. While in US 40% and Europe 12% of employers had trouble finding people with the required skills.

As machines get smarter and more capable of doing chores formerly done by humans, employees need to develop edge over machines, like critical thinking and creativity. The skill set is expected to change radically over next few years.

Considering the overall disruption that industries are undergoing, with current trends, competition for talent in most desired jobs such as Computer and Mathematical and Architecture and Engineering and other strategic and specialist roles will be fierce. And finding effectual ways of securing a talent pipeline will be a priority for virtually every industry. At present also most of these roles across industries and countries are already perceived as hard to recruit. The situation is expected to worsen significantly over next few years.